September 26, 2009: Six Days to the Stargate: Universe Premiere! A Sneak Peek for the Cast and Crew!

Yep, only six days until the world premiere of Stargate: Universe! Have you told everyone? And I mean EVERYONE? Your pharmacist? That ex-girlfriend you dumped in college? The Hungarian woman in Accounts Receivable from your last job? No?!!! Well, what‘re you waiting for!

We’re not waiting. For October 2nd that is. Today, we held a special matinee screening of SGU’s first three episodes – Air I, II, and III – for the cast and crew. I’ve gotta say, there’s nothing like seeing it on the big screen. The performances were spectacular, the visuals stunning, and the last ten minutes of Air III had me on the edge of my seat (despite the fact that I’ve already watched it about a half dozen times).

Lawren, Ashleigh's guy, and Ashleigh. Before leaving the office on Friday, I asked Ashleigh to text me a reminder about the matinee. About an hour before the matinee, having received no reminder text, I texted her: "Hey, am I supposed to be somewhere today?" A moment later, I received her response: "No. It's Saturday. You're free." Later, I received a follow-up text: "Oh shoot. The premiere is today. I hope you can make it in time." I got it about five minutes after I'd taken my seat beside her in the theater.

Actor David Blue (SGU's Eli Wallace) scopes the crowd prior to the screening.

I look like one of those eccentric European fashion designers. Zis seazun zebra moccassins are een!

A candid shot of David Blue enjoying a little popcorn.

Show Creators/Executive Producers Robert Cooper and Brad Wright give a speech before the screening. "The blue honda hatchback, license number 987 DFJ - you are parked in a fire lane. You WILL be towed!"

SGU Director Will Waring strikes a pose. Then remembers too late he is camera shy.

Actor David Blue let me post the first two goofy pics so long as I posted at least one good photo. This one's going to be my desktop wallpaper.

Finally, as I was driving today, listening to the radio, I heard a radio advertisement for the Vancouver Symphony Orchestra in which they mentioned some upcoming performances, among them Itzhak Perlman and Lang Lang. Seriously! Lang Lang! Who wouldn’t pay to see a panda play the cello? I can’t wait!

Some of the SGU folks have been tweeting about this over at Facebook…er, I mean, twitter. They loved it! I can’t wait to share in that experience (well, somewhat, since I’m watching it on my piddly 21-inch TV) in 6 days!!

As for advertising the series, well, I’ve been increasing my references to Stargate among my fellow Physcists (to their amusement, as I can connect ANYTHING to Stargate), and I’ve continued adding “#SGU” at the end of every tweet. Best I can do, for now. A bunch of us are getting together the Thursday after next to watch the premiere on a projector screen. Hopefully that’ll convince anyone who didn’t tune in to the premier to tune in for its concluding 3rd part!

David Blue looks as if he has lost some “weight”
since filming the first few SGU episodes.

…and now that I think about it….him losing some
“weight” in real life might actually play into the new
situations that his character finds himself to be in
onboard the Destiny in the SGU storylines.

It kind of makes me wonder…did David Blue
actually “bulk up” *before* the start of filming
the first few SGU episodes?
Was this something that was planned ahead of
time for the growth of his character?…or in this
specific case…the “lessening” of his character?

Great pics of everyone, thanks! Were you the only person sporting designer shades *inside* the theater? — Hey, I’ll bet your Milanese fashion-show look caught Will Waring off guard, so you could get a nice photo. — In the shot of Carl and Paul, Paul does a fairly convincing anxious look (or else, “Joe, they’re waiting for you to sit down!” look), while Carl appears uber-confident and tough. In fact, to me his expression is very like that of Special Agent Gibbs of NCIS. Maybe that’s my cue to quit watching reruns 3x per week – ya think, DiNozzo? – Oh, sorry, just recalling a fav line.

Re: getting the word out, yesterday I dropped by the office of one of the docs here. It’s been a while since I last bugged him, so he was very congenial: “Come in, come in! Please, sit down and tell me how you’ve been.” Anyway, we chatted a bit, and I asked him what he watches on TV these days. When it was his turn to ask me the same, I talked about this good-looking new Syfy series called Stargate Universe. He just laughed, “You Americans and your science fiction!” (I don’t think it would’ve helped if I’d pointed out that most/many of the cast and crew are Canadians.) Then he went all psych on me, wanting to understand the appeal, etc. – No converts there, but the only metaphorical stone left unturned is the patient population. And given the patients with whom I work, that would be a major no-no.

Thanks again for posting so many fun pics, and to all who graciously consented to the impromptu snaps.

PS: Are you going to go to Itzhak Perlman’s concert? The man’s a legend. – Telling you what you already knew, right?

Cast pictures, you are brilliant. Loved each and everyone, especially yours with those glasses (still fav Brian…hmmm, maybe David).

Just makes me smile thinking of all you there enjoying the experience together. Wow, you are coming up on the end of the production season and some are seeing it for the first time.

You of course I notice said you watched it several times before the screening. I will record and watch it several times too. Did I say record, that is illegal and I would never do such a thing. It is Syfy I will watch over and over.

Thank you for the treat. All your hard work, I am touched by your talent and the gift you give to me. You once again, never disappoint.

Very nice pictures, and great captioning. One thing seriously missing though. The screaming, raving fans. what a wasted opportunity! A little advance notice and you might have had hordes of fans behind those silken cords(or police tape) while you and the other illminaries walked up a red(or faded pink) carpet. If enough fans couldn’t be rounded up in time, I’m sure some others might have been induced to join. Like, for instance, some anti-foie gras folks and maybe save-the-seaslug types. Then the media could have been positioned in a way that photos they took made the crowd look even larger, resulting in yet more of the precioius publicity. Oh, and I’m getting weird looks at my coworkers at this very moment as I announce Universe’s imopending premiere( this is the gang from the other station, not the folks I usually work with).
On an unrelated topic, Joe the Icepick just doesn’t cut it. While your wit is certainly piercing, it’s just too hard to picture you trepanning someone like that. I’ve been pondering some other monikers. Maybe some others will throw in a few choices of your own. Certainly you deserve to be addressed as more than “Joe”, or even Mr. M. So, try these out. Mallozzi the Magnificent. Mallozzi the Munificent. Mallozzi the Maligned. Joseph and the Script of Many Colors. His Evil Warlord, Joe, Leader of the Pack, His Creative Geniusship, Mallozzi the Foie-Gras guy. Mallozzi the Vancouver High Gourmand, Mallozzi of the great show scripts, cool comic series, wonderous short stories, unparallelled blog postings, hilarious dog pictures, and all round cool dresser and ok guy.
On that note, thanks for the fun post and now I’ll go slip off and take my meds…

Lovely pictures, everyone looks so great, happy and younglooking, in them and yes even that superfly behind those foster grants, haha. Maybe its your camera that is magic,(or the photog) it sure does take a lot of fantastic shots.
That Ashleigh, shes good for you Joe, keeping you on your toes I bet. (and on your guard) How funny!
I hope everyone enjoyed their performances as much as we will in just a couple days now.
Is that an actual theatre downtown or is there one on your studio lot?

Oh man! Six days and counting. I just finished my home theater collection. THX Ultra 2 receiver a 1080P Epson projector and high end polk audio speakers (newegg.com has great half off or more deals on occasion so I got about $4000 worth of equipment for under $2000 shipped). So this is exciting to get sci-fi HD (grr syfy) with the latest and greatest sound and picture visuals you guys can throw at me. Excited? You could say that.

Got a text to my phone, to check out the blog. So, here I am in the Internet Cafe on a Sunday!
Wow, great snaps of the cast/crew. Reminds me of the Continuum Cast and Crew Screening last year. Mr W looks so serious!!
Glad all had a good time. The Twitter talk on it was super-positive.

Totally hyped about the premier!!

Best to all

S’n’T

PS: Will be making the usual Mama Mallozzi’s Friendship Cake (which has become a regular feature of Season premiers here). Our best to her and her recovery!

Thanks for all the great pics Joe, I am stoked for the premiere this week. My wife has even given me permission to skip my son’s basketball practice to stay home and watch it! I’m thinking it’s for this week only, but we’ll see.

Hey, Syfy had a marathon of SG-1 on Friday and for the first time in a very long time I watched Wormhole Extreme, and loved all of the cameos. Have you done any other cameos beyond asking about the donuts?

@ Quade1: Ming Na’s full name is Ming Na Wen, so Ming Na is her first name.

It’s an interesting thing with Chinese names, as I don’t think we have middle names per se. There is one word (or in Daniel Jackson’s terms, one pictograph) symbolizing the family/last name, and several other words that symbolize the given/first name. Usually “several” = 1 or 2. For instance, by Chinese name is Zhi Fang Gao (though in Chinese, you say the last name first, so it’s Gao Zhi Fang), with the first two words being my first name, and Gao being my last name.

@Deni. I’ll conceed Malelovent Overlord works well for Mr. M. But Joey the Icepick? Just don’t see it. WAAAAY too well dressed for that moniker. But I’m just trying to see what sort of nicknames we can come up with, for the fun of it. Besides, nothing says the man has to have only one title….

Well, it’s not exactly a party, but we do have the tradition of launching a new Stargate season at our house with a big bowl of blue Jello. It’s unlikely the Destiny will be stocked with the ubiquitous blue powder, so I’m rather doubting that the dessert favored by USAF officers of two galaxies will be putting in appearance any time soon. Still…blue Jello and Stargate…they’re inseparable.

And speaking of food…will Mr. Waring be continuing his pineapple tradition in SGU or are they too un-alien for the Universe universe?

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